News of the Western Belize Recreational Area, about 500 square miles of waterfalls, caves, Mayan ruins and pyramids, Belize Alps, foothills, ranches and farms, tourist accomodations of all types and description, tours and expeditions for vacationers and visitors. Even a small growing expatriate retirement group of people from different countries. In Belize, this is where it is happening, all the things that are fun and even serious, with a climate of ETERNAL SPRING.

Saturday, March 31, 2012

The world demand for chocolates is rising about 3% a year. Belize does not yet export finished boxed chocolates, but it could. We have a half dozen small candy producers in chocolate for local consumption, but none yet with the capacity to export to Guatemala say, next door.

NO ANSWERS FOR THIS GUY LIVING RURAL IN BELIZE. INTERNET IS ONLY AVAILABLE IN DISTRICT TOWNS, MORE OR LESS.

( from listserve dealing with Belize rural business problems. )

Dear all,

I am totally, 100% fed up with my useless Hughesnet satellite system. I need an alternative solution to get internet here in bakabush. Any suggestions? I don't have line of sight to any existing phone network towers unfortunately.

CARIBBEAN GOVERNMENTS, POLITICIANS AND BUREAUCRATS ARE USELESS PARASITES, so hints an article by Ronald Saunders.

Economies are declining throughout the CARICOM countries, as educated populations grow and exporting the brain drain to industrialized countries gets more difficult. The PRIVATE SECTOR in Belize has a real tough time, trying to educate the local bureaucracy into subsidizing, or other methods to jump start new industries. They don´t get it.

Take FINANCIAL SERVICES. You can´t seem to get 90 mgbyte bandwidth internet, only 2 mgbyte on a shared basis, which quickly becomes outmoded, slow and halting and unsatisfactory when business expansion desires.

Mennonite machine shops constantly complain, the cost of importing raw metal materials to make things is so heavily taxed, it becomes impractical to make stuff here.

So are we producing inventors? Anybody trying to make a 5 hp hot hydrogen plasma turbine, home generator, using fusion physics? Cheap material cost, but expensive brain power needed here. Thats all it is. The knowledge between your ears.

Maria Otero, high placed muckity muck USA State Department, comes to Belize to defend USA drug consumer problem, with repeat of 40 year old war on drugs. Guatemalan President with his de-legalization debate has prompted mid-low-level USA bureaucrats to take notice.

WHAT CENTRAL AMERICA NEEDS IS A SIX LANE FREEWAY FROM PANAMA TO MEXICO. WE ALSO NEED IN BOND CARGO AIRPORTS AND CUSTOMS POSTS, THAT ALLOW SHIPMENTS TO GO THROUGH THE CENTRAL AMERICAN COUNTRIES WITHOUT HASSLE.

U.S. Under Secretary responds to Guatemala Drug ProposalMar 29, 2012

The Under Secretary of State Maria Otero is the highest ranking U.S. diplomat to visit Belize in recent times. Otero is responsible for foreign relations on civilian security issues; including democracy, human rights, trafficking in persons and counter-narcotics. Since Otero arrived on Wednesday, she has been meeting with Non-governmental organizations and government officials to discuss a myriad of issues. Earlier today, News Five asked Otero what were her impressions of Guatemala’s President Otto Perez Molina’s regional meeting with leaders during which he sought to decriminalize drug consumption and establish a legal route for narco-trafficking.

Maria Otero, Under Secretary of State

Maria Otero

“Our sense of that meeting and certainly our own position which continues to be the position that we have held; is a position that does not believe that decriminalizing drugs is the proper approach to dealing with it. This is the position the United States has held and will continue to hold. We don’t believe that that is really the way to be able to address this issue. We note also that the countries in Central America agreed with that decision—they also questioned whether decriminalizing is the approach that we can take to this issue. Clearly as we are trying to address the threat that drug trafficking presents for the societies in Central America and certainly globally, we look at the role they are playing; it’s useful to have a debate, a discussion, on all possible alternatives for dealing with the issue. So certainly being able to discuss this topic is something that we welcome, but our position continues to be the one that we have held since the beginning. My visit represents the priority that President Obama and Secretary Clinton have for our bilateral relationship and partnership with Belize. Suring my visit I have had the opportunity to meet leaders, officials, to reaffirm our close partnership with the Belizean people. I have been impressed by the caliber of so many of your dedicated public officials working hard in ministries, hand in hand with the members of civil society to tackle some of the most difficult challenges facing Belize today—from corruption and gang violence to creating economic opportunity for all the members of the Belizean society. The United States is pleased that Prime Minister Barrow ahs prioritized these issues for the second term of his administration and we look forward to working together to tackles these complex challenges with concrete advancement and resource. Our nations share common aspirations and common challenges including transnational organized crime, drug trafficking.”Be Sociable, Share!

BELIZE IS TO INTERGRATE MORE FULLY WITH THE CENTRAL AMERICAN SYSTEM OF SEVEN JOINT GOVERNMENTS.

BELIZE Foreign Minister says it is similar to what we do with CARICOM in the far away West Indies.

From producers in Belize, the Central American joint integration system makes more sense, as the markets for Belize products are larger and easier to get to by road, to Central America. It is very difficult to try and sell goods to CARICOM countries, because of lack of Caribbean internal air transport and shipping, and the very small island markets, which often are not big enough to be cost effective.

BELIZE UNFAIR AT POPULATION REPRESENTATION. WOMEN ARE OSTRACIZED FROM POLITICS BY NASTY CAMPAIGN SLANDER AND NOT WILLING TO FACE SUCH A CRUEL GAUNTLET OF HYPOCRITICAL DOUBLE STANDARDS SET BY MEN´S SEX RULES.

Women In Politics graduate 3rd cohortSaturday, 24.03.2012, 09:35pm

Fifteen novice women leaders who represent the third cohort of the Women in Politics Training Programme received their certificates of completion at a graduation ceremony at the Belize Biltmore Plaza Hotel on Wednesday, March 21.

In Mexico where women outnumber the men in total demographics, the law sets a quota requiring all political parties to have 30% women candidates, but Belize has not yet reached that point.

Even though women are 50% of the electorate, there is only one woman elected to the House of Representatives. The ratio gets better in the Senate where five of the 12 Senators are women and two are Cabinet Ministers.

The National Women’s Commission is working actively to address this disparity through the Women In Politics programme. The latest participants have completed 13 weeks of training, and their graduation happily coincided with Women’s Month.

Friday, March 30, 2012

USA FINANCIAL TRADING CENTERS TO EXPLORE CAYO AND CAYES FOR LOCATIONS THIS SUMMER OR FALL. First one will notify me of an arrival date in June, when I return to Hillview, from Caye Caulker, after the Forest fire smoke season.

I´ve been contacted by TWO seperate MONEY MANAGEMENT COMPANIES. They want to come down and explore for a month or two, the practicalities of setting up financial trading centers here in Belize. One outfit is a small one, managing about $130 million USD. The other one is substantial also.

I´ve offered them FREE OF CHARGE to use my trading room, including sleeping and cooking accomodations; though I´ve already made excuses for the poor internet service out in Cayo and Hillview. Guess they will find out for themselves if the bandwidth and speed is up to their capacity? We are making a SWAP for training and mentoring. As they earn about 60% a year gross on capital, before taxes. Lots of involved risk control strategies I´m unfamiliar with, I´d like to learn from those more expert. MID JUNE, 2012, therefore is the deadline, for BTL to upgrade their Hillview internet service. Possibly with a REPEATER at the top of the hill, or more bandwidth and speed for the TWIN TOWNS.

I noticed this morning Friday, that palmetto stakes had been set out, further down the beach to hang the the fabric on to contain the sand, when the dredge pumps it ashore. So they must be intending to go forward eventually soon, with more beach reclamation? The dredge is not here though yet. Must be busy elsewhere on government work?

The Caye Caulker Town Council seems to have lost control of the malecon, or public scenic beach area. There are a number of new buildings going up on this public scenic, photogenic by the water side new beach.

Lester´s Rainbow restaurant bar and grill, was built about 25 years ago, over the water on posts and he paid to have the beach reclaimed and filled out to it. So one would suppose he would be grandfathered in? Frenchies was built on a pier over the water and has been in business about 35 years there. So that would be grandfathered in also. But newer constructions are going on this public scenic beach. Los Alos something restaurant and bar, a beautiful place, one story, has now built a second story above that, on the public beach obstructing the view of white sand, emerald water and coconut trees. I don´t know how they got away with building a two story building on the public beach? They certainly can neither own, or lease the beach which is public land. Another new one is called Jolly Roger bar. Very recently built and expanding. There are a number of stalls, which are portable for handicrafts, conch shells, vegetable stand and so forth along the beach, on the East side of Front Street. One ex- town councillor told me a story of how they used to put up wooden cabin type stalls, for LOBSTER FEST WEEKEND and decided to leave them up and rent them out to make the village council some money. That was several elections ago. He said, at the next election, he asked if they were collecting rents at the Village Council and they were liard and said yes, everything was paid up. He said, when the next Council got in, they found NOBODY had paid rent for two years and there was a backlog owing of $20,000. The new council had to write it off as bad debt. Some of those old stalls or cabins still have people in them running businesses on the beach. There is even a wooden public toilet by the water on the beach, while private property owners were forced to take theirs down decades ago. Property owners along Front Street that should now have scenic views and photogenic beach in front of their high income expensive properties are now blocked by unsightly shanty town structures. One can understand buildings on piers, associated with fishing tours, or commercial guide boats, but on the scenic beach itself? Doesn´t make sense. One disgruntled old councillor said, that town councillors that get into office for Caye Caulker are giving permission for their relatives to build on the scenic public beach. I believe somebody should send some of these new younger leaders in the Caye Caulker Town Council to Puerto Rico, or Nice in France, or someplace where the beaches are kept public, open and attractive. They need to learn that they have an attractive tourist package in a clean wide sandy beach with many coconut trees and no structures on it. Still, they are elected to control the beach, if they lose their economic benefits, they will only have themselves to blame. Not my place anymore. I no longer live there. Some day it will be extremely hard for a future island Town Council to have a bulldozer go through and clear every construction off. Islanders are usually soft hearted and would find it hard to do. Everybody has to eat, but the proper place for business is across Front Street, or on side streets elsewhere in the town. If a beach is reclaimed down around the South Point of the island, I would expect the southern end of the island past the airstrip to explode with new business development, skyscrapers and time share condos. Rainy season in June. Agriculture Department need several hundreds of coconut trees for planting on this reclaimed beach. They need about four rows of coconut trees wide between front street and the water line. Takes about 6 years to get dwarf coconuts to grow tall enough to be attractive for tourism. Trees also stop the squatters from moving in and building shacks. Caye Caulker has growing pains, and this is just one of them.

50 YEARS OF EXPERIMENTING TO PRODUCE HOT FUSION POWER. A 5 H.P. HOME FUSION GENERATOR IS IN THE WORKS IF THEY CAN LICK THE PLASMA DENSITY PROBLEM.

Fusion breakthrough

By Mark Halper

A plasma vortex forms inside an aneutronic fusion device and directly carries electrical current, without the need for turbines.

A small New Jersey company has reported a big step toward cracking nuclear fusion, the elusive energy source that many people regard as the Holy Grail of power.

Lawrenceville Plasma Physics Inc. said it has confined a gas at 1.8 billion degrees C. Its previous highest temperature was 1.1 billion degrees C, which it hit last year and which it says had stood as a fusion industry record since 1978.

As hot as the earlier 1.1 billion degrees C might sound to you and me, it was too frigid to support LPP’s “aneutronic” approach to fusion.

“The new work shatters those long-standing records, and, most importantly, achieves the temperature needed to burn aneutronic fuels,” the Lawrenceville, N.J.-based startup says in a press release.

Unlike today’s nuclear fission, nuclear fusion combines atoms, rather than splits them apart. Many people regard it as a potentially safe, cheap, CO2-free source of power that does not pose serious nuclear waste problems the way uranium-based fission does. It does not use uranium. Rather, it tends to deploy different forms of hydrogen, among other fuels.

The “aneutronic” form of fusion would use common hydrogen, rather than the isotopes of hydrogen on which several other fusion projects rely. (”Aneutronic” means “without neutrons” - normal hydrogen has no neutrons in its nucleus, just a proton).

If perfected, aneutronic fusion could be the ultimate of the ultimate power source, because it generates electricity directly, without using a turbine. Other forms of fusion, as well as nuclear fission, generate heat that creates steam (sometimes another gas) that drives a turbine.

But aneutronic requires severely higher temperatures than other forms of fusion, which theoretically operate at around 100 million-to-150 million degrees C. (And then there’s “cold fusion” which we’ll save for a rainy day; feel free to comment below).

Facing Fusion: LPP chief scientist Eric Lerner at work.

LPP’s 1.8 billion degrees in principle topples the temperature barrier. The accomplishment marks the second breakthrough of three that LPP says is necessary for it to commercialize fusion. LPP had already demonstrated that it can confine fuel long enough to burn it, at tens of nanoseconds.

Now for its third and final trick: “We are still far from having sufficient density in the tiny hot regions to get net energy, but that is our next goal,” says Eric Lerner, LPP’s chief scientist.

LPP director of business development Derek Shannon told SmartPlanet that once it reaches sufficient densities, it will have also achieved a net balance of energy output to commercialize a fusion device. In over half a century of research and development, the fusion industry has not yet managed to achieve an economical “gain” of energy out compared to the energy required to produce fusion-based electricity.

Shannon said that LPP could commercialize its fusion device about four years after hitting the required density. It’s not clear how long that might take.

“The LPP research team is currently upgrading their fusion device to achieve the higher densities required for net energy, a goal they hope to achieve soon,” the press release states.

To reach 1.8 billion degrees C, the company is using a technology known as dense plasma force (DPF), which fires lighting-like magnetized plasma balls of fuel at each other in a compressed space.

LPP is experimenting with a hydrogen isotope, called deuterium, which is one of the two isotopes that “common” (neutronic) fusion uses (the other is tritium). LPP’s goal is to eventually use normal hydrogen and boron as its fuel.

Part of its vision is to install small, garage-sized 5 megawatt fusion devices to provide neighborhood power.

Other companies working on aneutronic fusion include Tri-Alpha Energy, a stealth startup in Irvine, Calif. Startup General Fusion of Burnaby, Canada, and Helion Energy of Redmond, Wash., are chasing “neutronic” fusion.

Between them and LPP, it’s looking more likely than ever that fusion could hit the market within a decade or so - which is faster than the large, international government backed projects like ITER in France and the National Ignition Facility at California’s Lawrence LIvermore National Laboratory will accomplish ________________________________________________________

Electricity Generation and PropulsionNuclear Fusion Reactor - Power Plant If aneutronic fuels are considered, products from fusion reaction are positively charged, which can be deflected by magnetic and electric fields. Fusion products at high specific impulse values, fusion reactor with a higher power/weight ratio, implie a propulsion about a million times more powerful than a chemical rocket.

A conversion to electricity is relatively simple. The conversion is done during the neutralization by a positive electric voltage to slow down and an electron gun to neutralize. A positive electric field forces the positively charged products to exchange their kinetic energy into potential energy. The positively charged products easily attract electrons from an electron gun, and the electron gun extracts electrons from a positive terminal of a capacitor increasing its positive voltage, which increase its stored energy (E=½CV²). A switching-mode power supply sends this energy to a battery bank. The current of electrons and the electric voltage is equal to electric power (P = V × I). This method of electricity conversion can exceed 95% of efficiency.[8]

Thursday, March 29, 2012

Noticed a sign in Atlantic Bank yesterday that was advertising small loans at 7.5% My C.D.´s are dropping to 4%. The loans at the bank are cheaper than at the LOCAL Credit Union right now. My credit union in the USA is only paying 1/2 of 1% interest on my savings account.

CONTRIBUTION FROM DEBATING LISTSERVE

"Ray, those loans are not amortized, meaning that you don’t pay interest on a declining balance, you pay interest on the entire amount, which means a 7.5% loan is really something like 18%."

- small bank loans are really 18% in the real world.-

________________________________

Ray:

Let's plug in some real numbers so you can see what Mary was talking about.

To calculate a non-amortized loan, you take the principal amount of the loan and multiply it by the interest rate. For example, if Atlantic Bank were offering you a $100,000 loan at a fixed rate of 7.5%, this would yield $7,500 per year in interest. If this were a 10-year loan, the total interest charge would be $75,000. That is the cost of the loan. The monthly interest payment would be $75,000 / 120 months = $625.00, and the total monthly payment would be $1,458.33.

If the bank were to offer you an amortized loan for the same amount for the period at the same interest rate, your monthly payment would be $1,187.02, a monthly difference of $271.31. Your monthly interest would start of at $625.00 in the first month of the loan and gradually reduce to $7.37 in the last month of the loan. Your total interest over the life of the loan would be $42,442.12, a whopping $32,557.88 less than the non-amortized loan.

So Mary was on the right track but a bit off on her estimate of the actual interest rate. If you paid a total of $75,00 in interest on a $100,000 amortized loan over a period of 10 years, the interest calculates to approximately 12.4%, not 18%.

Steve ____________________________________________

JAGUAR CAPITAL MANAGEMENT IS GOING TO END MARCH AT A STOCK PRICE OF .74 CENTS. STARTED THE YEAR AT .73 CENTS, HIT A HIGH OF .76 CENTS IN FEBRUARY. BY END OF MARCH,THE FIRST QUARTER, RATE OF RETURN WILL BE +3% SO FAR, 2012.

RURAL WOMEN AND MEN IN BELIZE, ARE MAKING A LOT OF CUSTOM MADE CRAFTS, BUT CANNOT SEEM TO EXPORT THEM AND GET THE COST OF THEIR LABOR OUT OF IT. MY WIFE FOR INSTANCE HAS MADE USING THE BACKSTRAP LOOM, THE TIME CONSUMING WALL HANGINGS, BELTS, KEY FOBS, SHAWLS, PLACE MATS, BUT THE PRICE SHE GETS FOR THEM ON THE LOCAL SCENE DOES NOT EVEN BEGIN TO PAY HER LABOR. LUCKY IF SHE JUST COVERS HER MATERIAL COSTS. SOME KIND OF EXPORT BUYER, PAYING FAIR TRADE PRICES WOULD GO A LONG WAY TO STIMULATE RURAL CRAFT PRODUCTION.

In posh, high end stores like Barney's in New York, a product called Maya Bags fetches premium prices, comparable to upscale designer products.

Those bags are made entirely in Belize by Mayan women from villages such as Columbia, Dolores, Otoxha (Oto-sha), Indian Creek and other communities.

Well, work from native women is also being celebrated in Belize by the Women's Department, as part of women's month activities.

They are having a two day Expo featuring locally grown spices along with a variety of baskets, carvings, clothing and accessories.

Cynthia Williams from the Women's department who told us what is being sold and why Belizeans buy it.

Cyntha Williams - Coordinator, Women's Department"Today, we are having a Maya's Women Expo as part of Women's Month activities. We wanted to really contribute also to a year of the Mayans, which is being observed by the Ministry of Tourism. So we invited several women's group with whom we work with throughout the year, to bring their products that they produce to sell it within Belize City. We have groups from Toledo and Stann Creek district, and we have a variety of products that they produce including Maya pepper, yellow ginger, anato, kasham and also products that do for example Maya blouses, jewelry that they make, slave cravings, and also baskets make out to the jippy jappa material."

Robin Schaffer"Have you been getting much activity today?"

Cyntha Williams"Yes, we are very happy with our outcome. We have had a lot of Belizeans which is very good for us, to see that our Belizean people are receptive and are contributing to the empowerment of these women groups. So, we had a lot of Belizeans coming in to purchase Maya pepper. The amount that we brought in today actually finished, but we will bring in more for tomorrow. We really are encouraging the general public to come out and support these groups. A lot of times, we feel like some of these items may be sold at a high price, but when you really look at the time and the skills required to produce these items, it is a lot. It is a labor of love."

The expo will continue tomorrow at the NICH parking lot on Regent Street, of the port coastal town of Belize City, in the center of the country along the coast, and will be open from 9:00 to 4:00.

Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Belize government dredge stolen from Caye Caulker, while on assignment to do beach reclamation? It´s gone, disappeared.THE DREDGE DISAPPEARED FROM CAYE CAULKER AFTER THE ELECTION.

The Government dredge disappeared from Caye Caulker AFTER THE ELECTIONS. Just a lick and a promise in TWO small locations and the election was over and then the DREDGE doing the so called beach reclamation DISAPPEARED. THE ELECTION WAS OVER AND THE UDP GOT BACK IN OFFICE and that was it, ladies and gentlemen.

In the meantime, the United Arab Emirates are claiming the beaches in Belize are the best in the Caribbean Sea. Go figure that one? I think Puerto Rico has better?

ARABS FROM THE PERSIAN GULF ARE TOLD BY A LOCAL ENGLISH NEWSPAPER IN THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, THAT BELIZE IS THE NUMBER ONE TOURIST DESTINATION FOR SCUBA DIVERS AND SNORKELERS. Wonder what happened to the Red Sea coral reefs?

Belize's Snorkeling Is World Class – Even in the UAE!

Belize is once again at the top of another international tourist list, this time topping the list of perfect destinations for diving and snorkeling. 'The National,' an English newspaper based in the United Arab Emirates, nominated Belize as the second best snorkeling location in the world.

This top 10 nomination for snorkeling comes on the heels of Belize's beaches being ranked 7th, 8th, and 9th in Central America by Trip Advisor.

GERMANY PROVES TO BE A BETTER FINANCIAL RESOURCE ON BELIZE ECONOMIC DATA, THAN THE GOVERNMENT OF BELIZE, OR THE LOCAL BELIZE STATISTICAL DEPARTMENT IN BELMOPAN

A recent query from a TALK SHOW participant on things Belizean, showed that German data on the Belize Economy was superior to that of the International Development Bank, International Monetary Fund, or any other regional banks. German data on the Belize economy was relatively up to date and summarized well, while the local government of Belize, was running 4 to 7 months slow in reporting economic data. The Belize Government Statistical Department Data has deteriotated. from a once proud, prompt, information source service some five years ago, to running about three years slow, with irrelevant data of no current, up to date, use to the local private sector business community. One could say the Belize Statistical Department has finally slowed down to the level of the Lands and Immigration backlogs.

BELIZE GOVERNMENT DECIDES ON NEW SLATE OF MINISTERIAL CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICERS

The new Chief Executive Officers who will get to lead the newly organized ministries.

Sharman Hyde – CEO of Finance and Economic Development.Beverly Castillo – CEO of Ministry of Natural Resources and Agriculture.Mike Singh – CEO of Trade, Investment, Private Sector Development and Consumer protection.Dr. Wendel Parham – CEO of Forestry, Fisheries, Sustainable Development & Indigenous People.Dr. Colin Young - CEO of Energy, Science and Technology and Public Utilities.Alexis Rosado – CEO of foreign affairs.Col. George Lovell – CEO of the newly reconstituted National Security.Lawrence Sylvester - CEO of Housing and Urban Development.Carlston Goff - CEO for Works and Transport.Lindsay Garbutt - CEO for Tourism and Culture.Dr. Peter Allen - CEO for Health.Candy Saldivar is Godwin Hulse’s CEO in Labor, Local Government and NEMOMarion McNab - CEO for Public Service and Elections and Boundaries.Judith Alpuche - CEO for Human Development.David Leacock – CEO for Education and Youth.

The Speaker of the House will be attorney Mike Peyrefitte, The President of the Senate will be former UDP Orange Walk South Standard Bearer, Mark Pech and the Cabinet Secretary will be Carlos Perdomo. The leader of Government Business in the Senate will be Godwin Hulse who replaces Doug Singh – the former police minister who will no longer be either Senator or Minister. ( Doug Singh demoted by political controlling party gang )

Last week we told you about the launching of the Municipal Development Project in Punta Gorda where a contract for about $425,000.00 was signed. Well, this AFTERNOON a $218,000 contract was signed to enhance safety and traffic flow on the busiest roads of San Ignacio, Santa Elena and Belmopan. It was signed in Belmopan at the Social Investment Fund headquarters by the Executive Director of the SIF, Mr Daniel Cano and Mr. Hugo Lemus who signed on behalf of Modern Construk a construction company. It represents the formal launching and first civil works projects as a part of the Belize Municipal Development Project. This 5 year project is being financed by the Government of Belize through a 30 million dollar loan from the World Bank. The main objective of the BMDP is to improve access to basic municipal infrastructure and to enhance municipal management in selected Town and City Councils. ____________________________________________________

HILLVIEW, a suburb of the TWIN TOWNS consisting of San Ignacio and Santa Elena Towns, in the 23 years of it´s existence, have NEVER ever, had it´s streets paved, even once. Residents of the town Santa Elena Town, complain the Town Council of San Ignacio continuously re - construct their side of the river twin towns, year after year, but NEVER do anything on the Santa Elena Town side of the Macal River. It is time Santa Elena Town had it´s own Town Council.

Monday, March 26, 2012

Panama was listed in first place, mostly because of the dollar economy. When my wife and I went to Panama, we found it expensive.

Belize is listed second as a retirement abroad place. The offshore cayes and Western Cayo District were mentioned as best local places. Cost of living, food, rents, utilities and medical treatment are about 20% of the USA.

Ecuador was listed as third place. You can fly there cheap from Miami, but not from Central America.

Western Belize already is reporting overloading of minimal available capacity, broadband 2 mgbytes, with angry customers unable to conduct business, cut offs, and slowdowns. The shared system seems to be not enough all other services being equal.

Debt to GDP ratio 81.4% ( among highest in Latin America )External debt alone, Debt to GDP ratio 67.3%Population GDP per capita $4,800 usd in 2012 ( $9,600 bz local currency )Bank provisioning for non performing loans 15.5% ( not enough )Fiscal reserves stable at about $200 million usd.Budget balancing has worsened over last four years and more than doubled under the UDP.Public Debt has declined a bit from 80.2% to 77.7%External debt has declined in last 4 years from 73.1% to 67.3% of GDP

Export markets: USA takes 30% and the U.K. takes 20% of productionCredit Quality of local banks POOR. Though they are awash with too much local currency. Interest rates are declining steadily and as part of savings, Bank CD´rates are become more irrelevant every day. Those of the population once getting 3/5 th´s of their income from Bank C.D. interest, are now being squeezed, as their savings no longer produces enough to maintain former living standards for local retirees and pension holders.

Sunday, March 25, 2012

HONDURAS AND GUATEMALAN PRESIDENTS TABLE RESOLUTIONS FOR DRUG WAR IN CENTRAL AMERICA.

We neither grow, produce or actively consume the drugs destined for the USA. The problem is the criminal USA activity in illegal drug consumption. The USA needs to pay for drug seizures intransit to their country, to each Central American country. Or stop the consumption in their country, they said. Money to be used for a new regional court system, to deal with the fallout being experienced by Central American countries of drugs going intransit to the USA from South America.

Saturday, March 24, 2012

New book, reports two major things, to identify why ISRAEL a small country outpaces the rest of the world in innovation and business startups.

1) Their military is based on getting the job done, or mission goal and provides valuable later life, inter-personal links from compulsory military service. Soldier often VOTE their unit commanders out of their leadership positions. They concentrate on making things work, even if they have to break the rules in the process.

2) Immigrants are the backbone of Israeli entrepeneurship. With nothing to lose and risk takers at heart, the immigrants are seen and proven to be a wonderful natural human resource. It was once that way in Canada and the USA and Australia as well.

A LESSON HERE FOR BELIZE TOO! Though we are well aware already, that our current small economic successes are based on immigrants and their second and third generations.

BELIZEANS WILL BE ABLE TO USE STATE OF THE ART DATA CENTER IN CURACAO IN EARLY 2013

Curacao to host region's most advanced datacenterPublished on March 24, 2012 Print Version

WILLEMSTAD, Curacao -- After months of design and engineering, Curacao Technology Exchange NV (CTEX) will start construction on what will be the region’s most advanced, and expansive datacenter.

Together with international partners such as Schneider Electric, and CISCO as well as local engineering and design firms, CTEX developed a state of the art energy efficient facility that will provide highly secure datacenter services to large scale enterprises, institutions and entrepreneurs throughout the Caribbean and Northern Latin America region.

“The CTEX datacenter is all about innovation and attention to details such as ensuring advanced power consumption ratings and providing customers the peace of mind that their data and business systems will be located in a highly secured datacenter. These advancements come from years of experience of the team, our partners, and leveraging lessons learned from other major datacenters across the world. We can therefore proudly state that there is no facility today, domestically or in our region which comes close to what we are building,” said Anthony de Lima, the company’s chairman and CEO.

“For Curacao it means the birth of a new economic sector and the opportunity to attract large enterprise customers in the region and the world to once again use Curacao as an international commerce and trading hub. This will ultimately have a positive impact on our foreign currency exchange levels. But perhaps more importantly, we will enable a new regional business segment which we refer to as micro-entrepreneurship whereby individuals and small enterprises will leverage our state of the art cloud computing infrastructure to rapidly launch new ‘cloud-based’ solutions, digital storefronts, and electronic marketplaces without having to rely on datacenters in North America or Europe,” de Lima added.

“The CTEX datacenter incorporates the latest engineering and design techniques. Schneider Electric, a worldwide market leader in datacenter design, together with local engineering firms incorporated lessons learned from developing datacenters across the globe to create a most advanced facility,” stated Andres Vasquez, Schneider’s enterprise manager for the Caribbean and Latin America.

Jorge Maia, CTEX’s lead architect said, “The facility is designed to withstand hurricane force winds up to category 5. It has been designed to run on its own power generation plants for a period of up to ten days without refueling should there be a major outage on the island or the region. Also, much attention has been placed on security; not a single area can be accessed without going through at least three man traps. We are using Greenblock technology together with solid reinforced concrete structures for the roof and exterior walls.”

“There are several reasons why Greenblock was selected for the CTEX data center project. First was the safety aspect. The data center is engineered to withstand winds exceeding 250 miles per hour. The walls consist of six inches of solid concrete and steel using polystyrene form blocks. Second, the polystyrene material provides an insulation factor significantly higher than regular concrete, resulting in improved cooling characteristics and more efficient energy consumption. Finally, there is the overall construction timeline which is significantly reduced,” said Rohan Watkins, Greenblock’s regional representative who will be overseeing installation, together with Dus Ron, CTEX’s local prime contractor.

“The datacenter facility has to comply with Uptime Institute’s Tier IV rating. This means that in addition to withstanding a hurricane category 5 on the Simpson Sapphire Scale, it must also withstand seismic zone #3 earthquake rating according to the UBC 97 code. All structural details are based on international construction codes. Special care was exercised in engineering the foundation, steel and roof structures,” says Gamal Douglas senior project manager at Civil Engineering Caribbean NV, CTEX’s local engineering firm.

“Scalability was a critical design aspect. The datacenter facility provides support for low to super-high density cloud computing technology. Highly secured racks, cages or suites are standard options. Efficient cooling was also a critical design aspect and incorporates a combination of in-row, peripheral and other cooling methods to meet varying customer demands. A power supply fabric which is split-up into four equal zones provides an extra safeguard to the 2N requirement making the chance of massive power failures nearly impossible,” says Franklin Rosheuvel, a director with Energy and Automation, Inc., CTEX’s local energy firm.

Project oversight and execution will be managed jointly by Lee Technologies (a Schneider-Electric company specializing in datacenter construction), and Civil Engineering Caribbean N.V. The CTEX datacenter has started taking client reservations and is expected to be operational during the first half of 2013.

The Mennonite community of Blue Creek in the Orange Walk district is mourning the tragic loss of Christopher Reimer, 23, who died when his ultra-light aircraft crashed near the Blue Creek airstrip around 8:00 Sunday morning, March 11.

Two of his friends on the ground said they witnessed how the wing of his aircraft collapsed in mid-air 100 feet up, and he plummeted to the ground. He suffered severe body injuries and did not survive, even though he was rushed to hospital.

His ultra-light aircraft was of the type that rather resembled a hang-glider with an engine suspended beneath the wing, which turned a pusher propeller behind the pilot’s seat.

Friday, March 23, 2012

In the digital age, most of today's young, hot-shot entrepreneurs are working in the world of high tech, specifically in social networking. Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter co-founders Biz Stone and EvanWilliams come to mind.

Then there's Ian Purkayastha, a 19-year old international businessman who's "networking" the old-fashioned way — face to face -- and making a big splash selling and promoting one of the world's most ancient and low-tech products: Truffles. To be sure, there aren't billions to be made in truffles, at least not yet. But truffles are by far the most-expensive ingredient in the culinary world, fetching up to $5000 per pound for the most desired varieties.

Truffles may be used in the world's top restaurants but there's nothing fancy about the truffle business. Truffles are subterranean fungi typically harvested in the wild or from specially planted groveswith the aid of trained pigs or, more recently, dogs. It's a dirty business, literally and figuratively: Truffles must be dug up and, especially in Europe, the black market for high-end truffles really is "black": dealers have been known to kill their rival's dogs.

Enter Purkayastha who, at age 15, fell in love with foraging for wild mushrooms in the woods of Arkansas, where he's originally from. Soon thereafter, he tried truffles and it was love at first bite. Purkayastha was so taken with the truffles he ordered some from a French distributor so he could cook with them at home. That might have been the end of the story — a kid with a sophisticated palate and an usual hobby — except that Purkayastha also has an entrepreneurial spirit.

After selling some of his truffle stash to local chefs to help pay for his shipments, Purkayastha realized he had an opportunity to combine two of his greatest passions: truffles and sales.

[Related: Fashion Start-up Takes Aim at $20 Billion Industry]

Soon he had a Web site, Tartufi Unlimited, and was shipping truffles across the country. Then three years ago, when he was just 16, Purkayastha convinced a major Italian distributor, P.A.Q. Gubbio, to make him their North American truffle representative. "What I didn't realize," Purkayastha recalls, "is they didn't have any preexisting clients in the US. Basically I did everything to build the company from the ground up."

While most of his friends were finishing high school and heading off to college, Purkayastha headed east to make it big in truffles. From his base in Hoboken, N.J., just across the river from New York City,Purkayastha started knocking on kitchen doors at some of the top restaurants in Manhattan.

"I try not to disclose my age too often," he says. "When I was first starting out a few chefs wouldn't give me the light of day."

The restaurant and fine food industry is "an older man's game," says chef Jason Lawless of Tocqueville. "It's definitely interesting having someone this young" in the mix. Lawless, like many other top chefs in NYC, was won over by Purkayastha's persistence, deep knowledge of truffles and the quality of his wares.

Starting from scratch, Purkayastha built P.A.Q. Gubbio's North American business to over $1 million in sales in three years. Along the way, he apprenticed at P.A.Q's headquarters in Umbria, Italy andlined up some of NYC top restaurants, including Daniel, Per Se and Jean George, as clients. More recently, Purkayastha has hired (and trained) three additional salespeople and aims to build the business even further.

[Related: 8 Bizarre Tricks for Start-Up Success]

"It sounds cliché and corny but I had a dream and made it happen by working hard," he says.

Remember, Purkayastha has done all this before the age of 20 and yet manages to stay grounded, humble and mature well beyond his years. When most of his peers can't pry themselves away from the computer screen, or are living at home because they can't find work, Ian Purkayastha isthriving in a rarified world — and eating very well.

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The Driven Team is on a nationwide search for the next entrepreneur to be featured in an upcoming episode! Share your story with us at Driven@yahoo-inc.com or follow us on twitter @aarontask #drivenstories.

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

MORE ON RE-STRUCTURING THE SUPERBOND DEBT THAT HAS A CHOKE HOLD ON THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF BELIZE

source unknown - taken from a Belize listserve debating membership -"The rhetoric recently adopted by the UDP on the superbond is reminiscent to us of some of the arguments that were being put forward in Ecuador before the government declared the majority of its outstanding debt illegitimate and defaulted. In Belize, statements by the prime minister and other UDP leaders that blame the size of the current bond (which was itself the result of a restructuring in 2007) on the opposition People's United Party (PUP), seem to be pointing in the same direction.

Following Barrow's re-election, we believe the question is not whether a restructuring of the superbond will actually be attempted - as this is the declared intention of prime minister Barrow - but rather whether the restructuring will be carried out in a way that could isolate Belize from international sources of financing. While it is still early to assess what the exact terms of a restructuring could look like, we highlight that access to international capital remains vital for Belize, given the country's anemic economic growth, persistent fiscal deficits and a weakening investment outlook. Should the renegotiation of the terms on the superbond result in a disorderly default, we believe the country's economic outlook could deteriorate rapidly over the coming years." _________________________________

Comment: Myself I believe Barrow our PM and Finance Minister is not at all worried about external financing. Since the SUPERBOND was established, to absorb, what at the time, was publicly generally believed to be an embezzlment operation to put MILLIONS abroad in private political hands, using foreign bank loans. Nobody was ever prosecuted and the rumor mill quotes, at least one of the rascals of the triumvirate that allegedly embezzled millions, might himself have bragged that he got $500 million out of it. True or not! It was a crooked shady deal all round. However the nation of Belize got saddled with the financial economic wreckage afterward. Barrow has pointed out that Belize does not borrow any monies from foreign commercial banks, since that debacle of the PUP SUPERBOND. At least in the meaning of world financial centers. What we do nowadays, is use the growth of REGIONAL FINANCING from places like the IDB, the new Central American financing system, the new coming online, Mexican financing system, CARICOM funding and sometimes even the OAS. we have no future intentions of borrowing as a nation, from International Commercial banks. Nor do we need to. In the last four years, the UDP under BARROW has switched a large part of our funding to internally financed Belize Treasury Bills and where it is needed, we mostly go to the newer regional development bank centers we are partners and members and shareholders thereof. Much of our economic infra-structure has been switched to GRANTS from country governments that wish Belize well. Where those countries have set up their own projects they have been successful. Giving money directly to our own government sees too much financial waste. But projects run through NGO´s is working fine. The statement above in the preamble therefore; that we would be hurting ourselves, reputation wise by commercial foreign banks is pure NONSENSE, if we defaulted for example, or any other re-structuring, it is just not true. The memory of foreign banks is about three years. The UDP currently are just starting a 5 year term and can successfully finance anything needed nowadays, through regional financial centers, both Caribbean, Mexican and Central American. We have not used, nor do we need foreign commercial banks over the past four years, nor do we expect to need them going out the next five years. So defaulting, or any other re-structuring solution, like a BOND HAIRCUT might make for some unhappy INTERNATIONAL BOND HOLDERS, but in my opinion will not even make any kind of dent in the reputation of Belize, or our financial integrity. Likewise, Belize BONDS are known to be HIGH RISK, JUNK BONDS category and were never anything else. Bond holders simply allocated only a tiny percent of their portfolios to Belize Bonds and had to build in the RISK and write off provisions, before buying Belize Bonds. Losing them would not damage any known foreign Bondholder portfolios. The RISK of loss was already priced in. The reference to anemic economic growth is totally out of whack. For 300,000 people we are doing damn fine. Better than the record of the USA, or the U.K. or most of the EU countries. Our GDP is running about 3.1 % and if we can get the problems of importing material supplies tax free for manufacturing, we are going to end up in four years with a GDP of 4% or better. That would be HONEST GDP, not the PUP style of borrow and spend by the government to artifically boost the economy. - JUST MY OPINION - We could default and as Said Musa is often quoted, it would be just a lee breeze passing over, and in three years, nobody would even care. Nor would we ourselves even notice, as we do not borrow from anybody that would use it, to squeeze more money out of our government.

Mexican finance minister José Antonio Meade has announced the launch of an infrastructure fund for Mesoamerica and the Caribbean.

The fund will aim to contribute to the region's economic, social and institutional development, Meade said during IDB's annual meeting, taking place in Montevideo, Uruguay.

IDB and the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (Cabei) will help design projects and channel resources, Mexico's finance ministry (SHCP) said in a release.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón announced the creation of the infrastructure fund in December last year during a meeting of Central American and Caribbean presidents held in Mérida, Yucatán state.

An increase in the demand for financial and technical cooperation has led to a need for a new, more flexible financing scheme, Meade said. As well as project finance, the fund can absorb the cost of hiring technical assistance, engineers, finance experts and project managers.

While Calderón previously said the fund would be for US$160mn, the finance minister did not confirm the total resources available.

A NASA funded expedition using airborne lasers to study ancient Mayan ruins has also documented widespread illegal deforestation in the Caracol Archaeological Reserve. The lasers found that forest disturbance was actually 58 percent greater than recent satellite surveys showed, according new study in mongabay.com's open access journal Tropical Conservation Society (TCS). Such deforestation not only imperils biodiversity, carbon storage, and migration routes for Central American species, but could also lead to plundering of the Maya site of Caracol.

The NASA research employed a system known as LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) to discover unfound archeological sites in the jungle, once home to one of the Maya's greatest cities. But the expedition also provided greater insight into deforestation in the 10,340-hectare Caracol Archaeological Reserve, due to the sensitivity of the lasers even over satellite imagery. The new data shows that in all 11 percent of the reserve has been disturbed by illegal deforestation.

"Unfortunately, as we are learning more about the archaeological remains at Caracol with LiDAR, this same technology is also detailing extensive modern deforestation and looting along the Guatemala-Belize border that is encroaching several kilometers into the archaeological reserve and threatening the preservation of Belize’s cultural and natural heritage," the scientists write.

The loss of forests within Caracol Archaeological Reserve imperils a massive wildlife corridor that allows animals to move freely from Mexico throughout much of Central America.

"These forested areas function as important components of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor, which is being continually threatened by changes in human land use patterns within and beyond Belize," the authors write.

The use of LiDAR to detect even smallscale forest disturbance makes it a tool of the future for forest monitoring. The only impediment, according to the researchers, is its high cost.

LIGHT MANUFACTURING FORMATION IN BELIZE IS THWARTED BY VARIOUS - ADD ON - GOVERNMENT TAXES, IMPORT COSTS OF MATERIALS.

THE GOVERNMENT OF BELIZE NEEDS ALL THE MONEY THEY CAN GET, SO THEY SQUEEZE THE IMPORTER OF MATERIALS. CUSTOMS DUTIES, ENVIRONMENTAL TAXES, VAT, AND MANY OTHER ADD-ONS.

IT IS POSSIBLE THE DEFAULT OR RE-STRUCTURING OF THE SUPER BONDS, THIS YEAR, WILL ENABLE THE GOVERNMENT TO GIVE LIGHT MANUFACTURING SUBSIDY BREAKS. BUT THE IDEA IS NOT VERY LIKELY.

FOR EXAMPLE: IN ORDER TO SATISFY THE IMPORT DEMAND OF ELECTRICITY, NET METERING WAS INTRODUCED INTO BELIZE DEBATES ABOUT 22 YEARS AGO. WE HAVE GONE THROUGH 4 GOVERNMENTS AND NOT A SINGLE MOVE HAS OCCURED TO BRING THIS SELF SUFFICIENCY SYSTEM ABOUT.

WE ARE ONLY AS GOOD AS OUR ELECTED TYPE DICTATORSHIP LEADERSHIP ALLOWS US TO BE. THE LEADERSHIP SYSTEM POLITICALLY WE HAVE DOESN´T WORK AT ALL WELL. MIND YOU, WE ARE DOING BETTER THAN THE U.K. OR THE U.S.A. ( grin )

THE INTERNAL DEBATE ABOUT LIGHT MANUFACTURING SOLAR PANELS, OR ANYTHING ELSE IN BELIZE. SMALL LOCAL MARKET AND NO GOVERNMENT BREAKS MAKES IT IMPRACTICAL. YOU POSSIBLY COULD SELL OVER IN GUATEMALA WITH THEIR BIGGER MARKET. A 60 WATT SOLAR PANEL COULD PROBABLY BE MANUFACTURED AND SOLD FOR $1000 BZ, OR $500 USA, SKIPPING THE MIDDLEMAN. COMPETITIVE IMPORTS RUN ABOUT $1800 BZ. OR $900 USA OR MORE.

Debate on solar panel manufacturing from internal Belize local listserves.

LACK OF GOVERNMENT INCENTIVES CRIPPLING PRODUCTIVITY IN BELIZE?

-In all truth, passing a mandate to buy back "green" energy from home owners will change very little the Renewable Energy arena in Belize, and any where in the world for that matter.

Why?

Well first and foremost is the initial investment. Even with the recent price reductions in solar panels a homeowners return on investment (RI) is at about 10yrs.

Sounds ridiculous? Not really! The only reason such investments are in the neighborhood of 4-6yrs in the States and other developed nations is - because of direct government incentives -. In the US for instance, depending on the state, you get 15-20% state tax break on your install, about the same from the Feds, and some miscellaneous on your end of year fillings. So in truth you, the owner, is only forking out about .50C to the Dollar for your system. Not happening any time soon here.

Here in Belize, you have to pay the extra shipment/handling for all materials, nothing, absolutely nothing is manufactured here. There are some low ID tariffs on solar panels, but what good are panels for without wire, breakers, charge, controllers, inverters, etc,, all of which carry a 15-20% ID, plus environmental tax, broker fees, etc.. Let's not even go into batteries because I assume you're talking about grid-tied systems; but for the record they carry a nice 35% ID, plus all of the previously mentioned and more,,,,, oh, did I mention add 12.5% on top of all that for you know what......

Don't mean to play devils advocate on this one, you all know I love my industry, just giving out hard facts.

Sunday, March 18, 2012

TRIP ADVISOR VOTES HAD CAYE CAULKER ONE OF THE TOP TEN RECOMMENDED TOURIST ISLANDS IN THE WHOLE WORLD.

The LAZY LIZARD by the CUT through the island of Caye Caulker is re-doing their sea wall. Tourists who used to sun bathe and swim in the cut ( lots of them ) are now forced out on to the cement broken sea wall. I noticed this past month, that the sea wall is 4 to 5 feet higher than the sea. They, the tourists are having a lot of trouble getting into and out of the water, over the last month. It is the only decent bathing spot in the town and island.

IT SHOULD BE A PRIORITY FOR THE CAYE CAULKER TOWN COUNCIL TO BUILD A SET OF STAIRS, OR MORE THAN ONE, ALONG THAT CEMENT SEA WALL FOR TOURISTS.

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EASILY BUILT ARTICIAL REEF IN CAYE CAULKER

The mangroves that used to attract tourists snorkeling by the channel, or cut in the island have gone this year. Been removed for sea wall improvements. With the removal, went the habitat of several hundred grunts and snappers that attracted fish and tourists snorkeling. The area is barren now. As a tourist attraction, the Caye Caulker Town Council, need to place some artificial reef around the split, and sea walls. Mangrove branch tips, held in place by 2 foot long 3/8" rebar with a bend in them, to hold them on the bottom, would attract hundreds of fish and make for a tourist attraction. Both for snorkelers and for casting fishermen. Another way of doing it, would be to use plastic snow fence rolls. Roll a 30 ft, long 5 ft wide plastic snow fence, length wise. With mangrove branch tips inside it, and anchor them down along the sides of the shallows, or sea wall. Hundreds of small fish would be attracted and it would provide a good tourist draw, for the tourist community.

ONE OF THE TRAGIC THINGS ABOUT BELIZE AND ARTIFICIAL DOMINATION OF THE GOVERNMENT BY TOO MANY, VOTING CONSTITUENCIES IN THE PORT TOWN OF BELIZE CITY ( LESS THAN THE MINIMUM AVERAGE OF 5500 PERSONS PER CONSTITUTENCY )

Is the practice of making public regulatory announcements in that remote port town, about 18 % of the population, over the nation´s 7 districts, for political purposes. Enshrining rules, regulations and laws and announcing same in that same port town, dominated media enclave and assuming everybody in the nation of Belize is regulated and bound by such warnings and announcements.

When we in the other six districts, never knew, or even heard what the heck they are talking about.

There is a sad lack of communication between the political arm of government, the port town dominated media and the rest of the country of Belize. Often we do not hear about new rules and regulations and laws, until a year or so after the fact. Somebody came to explain to me ( one of my neighbors ) that you had to register a cell phone this year. Never heard about this before. Wonder why? Where the heck would you do that anyway? I´m currently on Caye Caulker for my health. Have no idea where you would register a SMART cell phone. Will look into it, when I return to the TWIN TOWNS in JUNE. Afer the forest fire season is over. I know where there is a SMART office there.

Belize Foundation for Research and Environmental Education (BFREE) Avian Monitoring Program in southern Belize. In 2006, BFREE and the University of North Carolina at Wilmington established an avian monitoring program onsite at BFREE in Belize. Now in its sixth year of a planned ten-year monitoring program, it is the first long-term bird study conducted in Belize. The program goals are to create and enhance links between protected areas and surrounding communities, provide baseline data on Neotropical migrant and resident birds, and determine the status of wild harpy eagles in the Bladen Nature Reserve and the greater Maya Mountains Massif. In November of 2011, BFREE technicians further identified the first known active harpy nest ever found in Belize.

Japanese financed and installed solar research project at the University of Belize,in the tiny capital of Belize.

JAPANESE SOLAR PROJECT GONE AWRY SOME SAY IN BELIZE?

Apparently the Government of Belize was to pass laws, to enable, or force BEL the monopoly government electricity producer, as part of the requirement for the Japanese big solar project at the University of Belize in the capital Belmopan. The government never did their part, by enabling NET METERING for small home producers of electricity. At least so far. The Japanese did install the solar project, but homeowners have not benefited from being able to produce electricity and sell it back to BEL. ______________________________________

contributed comment:

Ray, I don't think the Japanese gift of the solar project to UB/Belize and the legislation required would need to apply to homeowners or other private parties.

Legislation to allow UB to sell power to BEL should not be a problem since Gov. now owns BEL and the Japanese gifted system. Unless BECOL (the company that owns the hydro dams) would have some legal claim because I think the hydro dams are contracted to get first dibs on providing power to BEL. Or maybe the deal on power price from CFE Mexico is they get second dibs or Belize pays a higher price. Then you have BELCOGEN (the bagasse project) that might come into play with legal right to sell.

So, legislation could be more complicated than my first thoughts based on who owns what, but I don't see where homeowners or other private entities with alternative independent power system would come into play for two reasons. First of all, most homeowners and businesses who have independent power systems usually do so because the grid doesn't reach them and it costs to much or is logistically impractical to bring the grid to them. No grid access = no delivery system for sell back. The second reason is (imo) an independent system in Belize costs too much for anyone to want to install extra panels and equipment to sell power to BEL at a price less than or equal to what BEL pays BECOL or CFE for power. I can't see BEL paying independent providers more per kWh than they charge their customers.

Is the photo you posted in your email a photo of the UB solar project site?

The following information was released by the Inter-American Development Bank Click for Enhanced Coverage Linking Searches(IDB):

The Inter-American Development Bank Click for Enhanced Coverage Linking Searches(IDB) and the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) will provide up to $600 million in financing for renewable energy and energy efficiency projects in Central America and the Caribbean over the next five years.

The framework agreement was signed during the IDB's annual meeting today between IDB President Luis Alberto Moreno and JICA Senior Special Advisor Hiroto Arakawa. The financing will benefit IDB member countries that already are eligible for JICA financing: Belize, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama and Suriname.

"For more than 30 years, Japan has been a great partner of the IDB and, in particular, of our borrowing member countries,'' said Moreno. "This agreement is another example of Japan's efforts to help our region overcome key development challenges. This contribution, in addition to encouraging the adoption of climate-friendly energy investments, will support much needed mitigation measures to address the negative impacts of climate change among our most vulnerable nations in Central America and the Caribbean."

Arakawa noted that Central America and the Caribbean are at the core of JICA's agenda to address global climate change. "We count on the IDB's experience, knowledge and long-standing working relationship with the region to create a successful synergy in this effort," he said.

Under the agreement, the IDB and JICA have created two different co-financing schemes: joint-co-financing, in which the IDB will match the financing provided by JICA in each project; and parallel co-financing, in which each organization will separately finance specific components of an eligible project.

JICA will provide $300 million in concessional financing for the facility, which could potentially mobilize another $300 million from the IDB's own resources if all projects are financed under the joint co-financing scheme.

"We are considering potential projects in the areas of hydroelectric power plant rehabilitation, photovoltaic power generation, and installation of energy saving facilities and equipment,'' said Toshitaka Takeuchi, energy specialist and technical contact for the agreement at the IDB's Energy Division. "In addition we will explore financing opportunities for geothermal power generation considering its significant potential in the region."

All projects will be processed, approved and executed in accordance with the IDB's sovereign guaranteed loan policies and procedures in the case of joint co-financing.

This framework agreement was a result of two Memoranda of Understanding between the IDB and JICA, the most recent in 2011, focusing on strategic partnerships on renewable energy and energy efficiency, a key component of the Bank's response to climate change adaptation and mitigation. Under the recent General Capital Increase, the Bank sets a target of 25 percent of total lending to be dedicated to climate change adaptation, environmental sustainability and renewable energy.

Japan became the first Asian member country of the IDB in 1976 and has contributed over $5 billion to the Bank's financial resources and, more recently, an additional $3.5 billion to the capital increase.

SAVE THE XATE PLANT IN THE SOUTH WESTERN JUNGLES OF BELIZE FROM GUATEMALAN POACHERS.

GIVING your mum a big bunch of flowers will be the gift of choice for millions on Mother's Day tomorrow.

But it seems that the humble bouquet may be doing more harm than you might think - as new research shows that flower arranging is fuelling the decline of an exotic plant on the other side of the world.

Research from Bangor University has shown than the enduring art and huge industry of flower arranging is a reason behind the decline of exotic, wild palm leaves in the rainforests of Central America. The report has warned that exports used for the flower arranging industry are "threatening the existence" of the xaté palm leaves in Guatemala and Belize - used by many major florists in the UK and mainland Europe for their Mother's Day bunches.

Demand for the leaves - which are coveted for their strong green colour and beauty - are "threatening the survival" of the wild palms, with Mother's Day joining Valentine's Day and Palm Sunday as the peak points of the year for local producers.

Efforts are now being made by the Welsh scientists and the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, in London, to train local farmers to cultivate xaté for harvest, in a bid to stem the decline of the plant in the wild.

The extent of the xaté's plight is not known, but debates are under way about it being red-listed as a conservation concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Lead author of the study, Sophie Williams, said that the xaté palm leaves were exported to Europe and USA for flower arranging and have developed into a multi-million-pound industry.

She said that there had to be an emphasis on training local farmers and further research into its effectiveness in reducing pressure on xaté numbers.

She said: "It is mainly exported to the US and Europe, and it comes into Amsterdam and then moved throughout Europe and usually goes into higher-end flower arrangements.

"We have done a few calls to suppliers [in the UK] and they are used in quite a few major companies.

"People like this leaf in particular because it stays green for a very long time - it will often stay green for two to three weeks longer, and it is beautiful."

She said there was a "huge lack of awareness" among the British public that these leaves are in the millions of bouquets sent out for Mother's Day, and that it might not be sustainably produced.

MsWilliams would like to see a Fairtrade-style labelling system, thus guaranteeing producers a premium price, so people knew they were buying sustainably-produced leaves. She also said there was no local market for the leaves, so they were economically-dependent on exports, which made finding a solution to sustainable production "even more vital".

She said: "If we still want to have these leaves in our bouquets in 20 years' time, we should be bothered about this.

"A huge number of people are dependent on this plant species. And for some people, we should care because of the intrinsic value of biodiversity, that we don't have the right to exploit something to the point where it disappears.

"I would hesitate to tell people not to buy xaté leaves, because it will stop people whose incomes are already low from exporting. But people should be aware of the situation."

The research called for training to be given to local farmers to commercialise the growing of the plants to reduce the amount of wild plants being harvested. It had already been shown a success in trials.

Dr Colin Clubbe, of the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew and another author on the study, added: "The training programme had influenced behaviour by providing the skills needed to grow a new species but also it increased people's belief in their ability to grow a new species.

"This is critical for people to actually cultivate this important plant. The results from this study will help design training programmes for encouraging cultivation of over-harvested species."

GRAPHIC: ¦ Exotic palm leaves in your Mother's Day bouquet may have come from forests in Belize or Guatemala, Central America. Sophie Williams, right, of Bangor University, says export for the flower arranging industry threatens the survival of these palms in the wild.

Friday, March 16, 2012

GREECE PEOPLE BECAUSE OF THEIR LOOMING DEFAULT, EXPECTED TO OCCUR IN THE FALL MONTHS HAVE TURNED CREATIVE AND THERE ARE NOW A NUMBER OF BARTER CLUBS, ISSUING COUPONS, INSTEAD OF GOVERNMENT MONEY

A determination to ‘move beyond anger to creativity’ is driving a strong barter economy in some places

In recent weeks, Theodoros Mavridis has bought fresh eggs, tsipourou (the local brandy: beware), fruit, olives, olive oil, jam, and soap. He has also had some legal advice, and enjoyed the services of an accountant to help fill in his tax return.

None of it has cost him a euro, because he had previously done a spot of electrical work – repairing a TV, sorting out a dodgy light – for some of the 800-odd members of a fast-growing exchange network in the port town of Volos, midway between Athens and Thessaloniki.

In return for his expert labour, Mavridis received a number of Local Alternative Units (known as tems in Greek) in his online network account. In return for the eggs, olive oil, tax advice and the rest, he transferred tems into other people’s accounts.

“It’s an easier, more direct way of exchanging goods and services,” said Bernhardt Koppold, a German-born homeopathist and acupuncturist in Volos who is an active member of the network. “It’s also a way of showing practical solidarity – of building relationships.”

He had just treated Maria McCarthy, an English teacher who has lived and worked in the town for 20 years. The consultation was her first tem transaction, and she used one of the vouchers available for people who haven’t yet, or can’t, set up an online account.

“I already exchange directly with a couple of families, mainly English teaching for babysitting, and this is a great way to extend that,” said McCarthy. “This is still young, but it’s growing very quickly. Plainly, the more you use it the more useful to you it gets.”

Tems has been up and running for barely 18 months, said Maria Choupis, one of its founder members. Prompted by ever more swingeing salary cuts and tax increases, she reckons there are now around 15 such networks active around Greece, and more planned. “They are as much social structures as economic ones,” she said. “They foster intimacy and mutual support.”

The network is currently busy transforming a disused building owned by Volos university into a permanent exchange and barter space. It will host a daily market from next month at which members can meet and exchange without using cash. Several highly successful open-air markets were held throughout last summer, Choupis said, until the weather got too cold.

“They’re quite joyous occasions,” she said. “It’s very liberating, not using money.” At one market, she said, she approached a woman who had come along with three large trays of homemade cakes and was selling them for a unit a cake. “I asked her: ‘Do you think that’s enough? After all, you had the cost of the ingredients, the electricity to cook …’

“She replied: ‘Wait until the market is over’, and at the end she had three different kinds of fruit, two one-litre bottles of olive oil, soaps, beans, a dozen eggs and a whole lot of yoghurt. ‘If I had bought all this at the supermarket,’ she said, ‘it would have cost me a great deal more than what it cost to make these cakes.’”

What rules the system has are designed to ensure the tems continue “to circulate, and work hard as a currency”, said Christos Pappionannou, a mechanical engineer who runs the network’s website using open-source software.

No one may hold more than 1,200 tems in the account “so people don’t start hoarding; once you reach the top limit you have to start using them.”

And no one may owe more than 300, so people “can’t get into debt, and have to start offering something”.

Businesses that are part of the network are allowed to do transactions partly in tems, and partly in euros; most offer a 50/50 part-exchange.

“We recognise that they have their fixed costs, they have to pay a rent and bills in euros,” said Pappionannou. “You could say that their ‘profit’ might be taken in Tems, to be reinvested in the network.”

Choupis said she thought the network would have grown even faster that it has if people were not so “frozen, in a state of fear. It’s like they’ve been hit over the head with a brick; they’re dizzy. And they’re cautious; they’re still thinking: ‘I need euros, how am I going to pay my bills?’ But as soon as people see how much they can do without money, they’re convinced.”

The Greek parliament recently passed a law encouraging “alternative forms of entrepreneurship and local development”, including exchange networks such as Volos’s, giving them official non-profit status for tax purposes.

Choupis said there was a new mood abroad in Greece, a determination to “move beyond anger to creativity”.

“You are not poor when you have no money,” she said, “you are poor when you have nothing to offer – except for the elderly and the sick, to whom we should all be offering.”

BTL INTERNET SERVICE ON CAYE CAULKER WAS DOWN, FOR SIX HOURS THIS FRIDAY.

This seems to be a regular pattern, and I´m not sure what is the cause? All you get is a report of poor signal strength, about 41% and UNABLE TO CONNECT TO SERVER MESSAGE. From noon until six p.m. This is WI FI service here on the home island.

This is not the first time in the last month either. As I am in the financial markets through my broker in Chicago, this is a troublesom thing. Fortunately today I was not in the market. The other time I had trouble, I had just closed my trades about half an hour before I lost service to the internet via BTL on the island of Caye Caulker. Which was pure LUCK on my part, as I could have lost about $5000 usa dollars.

Apparently, my wife who just arrived from Hillview, said the service is similar out there in Hillview. It is getting worse she says. We have been talking once again, about moving to Melchor de Menchos and building a house over there in Guatemala, to conduct business, because of the internet service available in Guatemala. My brother in law, just returned from a week exploring the Western Guatemalan highlands and he likes the area and felt quite comfortable. Perhaps we shall explore selling our places here in Hillview and moving to Western Guatemala for the better internet service. We are planning a trip to explore possibilities of re-locating to Guatemala this FALL. Purely for internet service reliability.

At least one foreign would be investor business contact, wanting to relocate to Belize and is familiar with the country, has also expressed his concern and said since his business runs on BROADBAND internet, the lack of such service has stopped him from re-locating to Belize. He has no interest in living in towns. There have been a number of queries from friends in the hedge fund business, like myself about moving to Belize. ALL have become aware that the internet is just not available here. There was even some talk about building a skyscraper, or several 4 or 5 story buildings in the Pine Ridge area. But without infra-structure that was cancelled.

I´m being forced by poor internet service to re-consider our business options once again. SAD, but there it is! You have to live and work where you can do business. In today´s world, ALL businesses now rely on broadband internet. Broadband is only available around district towns, in Belize. Even so, the service available cannot sustain the subscribers they already have in a reliable manner. I had a discussion at the BTL office here on Caye Caulker and there is little that can be done. Whatever the problem, they evaded discussing it. Just propoganda and crapola, smoke screen verbiage. I´m stuck here until the end of MAY, though if I lose any serious money, will immediately abandon my place here and in Hillview and move to Guatemala.

"In international law, odious debt is a legal theory that holds that the national debt incurred by a regime for purposes that do not serve the best interests of the nation, should not be enforceable. Such debts are, thus, considered by this doctrine to be personal debts of the regime that incurred them and not debts of the state.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Don´t know how old this map is of oil wells drilled in Belize over the past 50 years? Some of these oil wells were capped as being uncommercial. Some were dry wells. I believe currently there are 5 oil rigs pumping oil commercially from two small ponds of oil in the Western Cayo District. I see that no oil well has been drilled, where there was oil seepage back when I was a young man. Nobody would pày me for the information, so I never told anybody.

Monday, March 12, 2012

March 12, 2012, 6:47 a.m. EDTAllEnergy Strikes Oil on Its First Well on Its Belize Concession

DES MOINES, IA, Mar 12, 2012 (MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) -- AllEnergy Corporation (otcqb:AFSE) AFSE -23.32% ( www.allenergyco.com ), a growth-oriented international energy company, announced today that it struck oil on its first well on the Princess Concession in Belize. The first well is expected to be completed and put into production following review by the Belize Regulatory Officials. It is estimated to contain up to 6 million barrels of recoverable oil. The reservoir was determined in size by Satellite Image and Chem-Tool. Pay zone depth was determined from actual drilling and mud logging. Porosity and saturation were gauged visually by outside consultants using statistical modeling with low side parameters, predicting a reservoir of 6 million barrels. This figure could grow depending on the trending of the reservoir.

Dean Sukowatey, President and CEO of AllEnergy Corporation, stated, "We are extremely pleased with our interests in this concession. AllEnergy purchased a non-dilutive four percent interest in a Belize corporation that owns half of the concession. The amount of potential here is tremendous. We look forward to developing the Belize concession."

About AllEnergy Corporation AllEnergy, an international energy company, is engaged in the acquisition, development and production of oil and natural gas. AllEnergy acquires and develops oil and gas leases which have "proven but undeveloped reserves" at the time of acquisition. These properties are not strategic to large exploration-oriented oil and gas companies. This strategy allows AllEnergy to develop and produce oil and natural gas with tremendously decreased risk, cost and time involved in traditional exploration.

The information in this press release includes certain "forward-looking" statements within the meaning of the Safe Harbor provisions of Federal Securities Laws. Investors are cautioned that such statements are based upon assumptions that in the future may prove not to have been accurate and are subject to significant risks and uncertainties, including the future financial performance of the Company. Although the Company believes that the expectations reflected in its forward-looking statements are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations or any of its forward-looking statements will prove to be correct. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements that speak only as of the date of this release, and the Company undertakes no obligation to update publicly any forward-looking statements to reflect new information, events, or circumstances after the date of this release except as required by law.